


Every Day After

by iihappydaysii, MistressPandora



Category: Outlander (TV), Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Alternate Universe - Wedding Planner, Coming Out, F/M, First Kiss, M/M, Modern AU, breaking up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-16 23:40:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28839507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iihappydaysii/pseuds/iihappydaysii, https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistressPandora/pseuds/MistressPandora
Summary: John is Jamie and Claire's wedding planner and it gets complicated. Modern AU.
Relationships: Claire Beauchamp/Jamie Fraser, Jamie Fraser/Lord John Grey
Comments: 43
Kudos: 43





	Every Day After

John Grey should’ve backed out of this job. He had the chance to do it and he did consider it, but in the end he reckoned he was a glutton for punishment. What else would you call the wedding planner helping the groom he was in love with fix his damn tie fifteen minutes before he was going to walk down the aisle and pledge his life and heart to someone else?

Grey forced a smile as he adjusted Jamie Fraser’s tie to fit around his strong, broad neck. The sight alone made his mouth dry. When his old college roommate had called him up asking for a favor, to plan his wedding, Grey never imagined he would end up feeling like this. Sure, he’d had a hell of a crush on Jamie back then, but that was nearly a decade ago. He’d thought he’d moved on—especially because Jamie wasn’t gay—but after the last months they’d spent together, Grey’s feelings were stronger than ever. 

He was left standing there, forcing a smile, while his heart was breaking. 

"Thanks, John. I swear I kent how to tie one of these yesterday." Jamie inspected his appearance again in the mirror. It was perfect, of course. Shoes well polished, not a pleat of his kilt out of place, fly plaid pinned just so over the shoulder of his Prince Charlie jacket. Even the rabbit fur on his sporran appeared to have been brushed into impeccable order. "It's no' second thoughts," Jamie said, though Grey had absolutely not asked. "Just nerves. Is Claire faring better that I am?"

Of course Jamie wasn’t having second thoughts. Grey already knew he wasn’t, and yet the confirmation made his treacherous heart crack even more. He cleared his throat and stepped back. “She has that surgeon’s calm, but I’ve been doing this long enough to know she’s nervous too.” 

It wasn’t the whole truth. Claire _had_ seemed calm, just as Grey had said, but he hadn't noticed any wedding day jitters when he’d seen the bride earlier. Not that he had much opportunity to do so. She’d spent almost the whole morning on several calls from the hospital. The fact that she was almost always working was how Jamie had ended up planning the vast majority of the wedding and how he and John had ended up spending so much time together. And there had been that one night after too much whisky, and they had been so close on that sofa and Grey had almost kissed him. Thank God Jamie’s phone had rang just then and it had been Claire. The sound of her muffled voice had been enough to sober him up. 

Grey patted Jamie on the shoulder. “You’ll do fine. Remember. Don’t lock your knees. You’d be surprised how many grooms have passed out that way.”

Jamie laughed, more anxious than humorous. "I'll remember. I dinna want Claire's friends discovering what a Scotsman wears under his kilt. No' like that anyway."

Grey flushed red at the thought, and hoped Jamie didn’t see it. “The last time you were naked in front of a large crowd you were outside in two feet of snow, pledging that fraternity.” 

"Oh, God," Jamie groaned, but he was smiling. A charming, gorgeous smile. As intended, the memory visibly dispelled a good chunk of Jamie's nervousness. "Those aren't exactly the glory days I need to relive. Especially no' in church." He bent and straightened the sgian dubh in his sock, even though it didn't need straightening. Then he started fiddling with his sporran, or rather, that's what it looked like. Instead, he opened it and withdrew a small silver flask, unscrewed the cap and took a little sip. He offered the flask to Grey. "Ye look like ye could use a wee dram too."

“I can’t. I’m at work,” Grey said, nudging Jamie’s side. His eyes lifted and met Jamie’s. He didn’t want to leave this room. He wanted time to stop, so he could stay forever in this moment looking at those perfect blue eyes. “Are you ready for this?” _Because I’m not._

Constitution sufficiently fortified, Jamie dropped the flask back into his sporran and snapped it closed. "Aye," he said, a bit rushed and frantic. Then he took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Aye. Ye’ve taken care of everything, so it's perfect. And so long as we're married at the end of it, it was a success." Jamie spoke the last sentence like a mantra, one he'd repeated on several occasions over the past weeks as the date of the ceremony loomed.

Grey stepped back, needing the distance. “It’s my job so I shouldn’t say this, but the flowers and the venue and the food, none of that is what matters. What matters is every day that comes after and the person you choose to give those days too.”

* * *

_Smile. Don't lock your knees. Breathe. Don't squat either, clotheed._ Jamie repeated John's advice in his mind over and over, his friend’s calm voice in his head soothing his frayed nerves. John had also told him to take every chance he had to look around and enjoy the moment, commit some details to memory because the whole thing would be a blur later. Jamie did that now, taking in the sea of faces, family, friends, a few of Claire's classmates from medical school, and plus-ones. Nearly a hundred, at final count. A few met his eyes and Jamie remembered to smile at them.

He was exhausted. Jamie hadn't slept a wink the night before. _It's not second thoughts._ After the rehearsal dinner, he'd kissed Claire goodnight—bad luck to see the bride before the wedding—and she'd gone to the hospital to make sure everything was in order for her to be on leave. And then Jamie and John had spent three hours talking about absolutely nothing in particular, Jamie hating the thought that this rekindled friendship would be over when the wedding was.

Jamie and John had spent a lot of time like that over the last few months. More time together than Jamie had spent with his fiancé, awake at least. 

The music had changed at some point, and a whispered, "Christ Almighty," from his best man Ian drew Jamie's attention to the aisle. His sister Jenny, serving as Claire's matron of honor by virtue of being the closest thing Claire had to a sister of her own, was positively resplendent in her dark green dress. Jamie took a moment to commit that to memory. He smiled at his sister. 

_Don't lock your knees._

And there had been that afternoon at the bakery. Claire got pulled into emergency surgery and couldn't make their appointment, so it was just Jamie and John picking out the cake. They had spent as much time making each other laugh as they did debating the virtues of chocolate or vanilla, and Jamie had come dangerously close to kissing a smear of buttercream off John's mouth. 

The music changed again and the guests rose and turned. Claire was breathtaking. Her dress was pure white and covered in fine lace, and a Fraser tartan sash to match Jamie's kilt made the whole effect absolutely ostentatious in the best way. She held onto Joe Abernathy's arm as he walked her down the aisle. Jamie could see John over Claire's shoulder. Maybe no one would notice that Jamie was staring at the wedding planner instead of his bride. No matter how stunning Claire looked—and she was that—he was drawn to John as if by a magnet. 

John stood in the back of the room. His face was stoic, the picture of professionalism. At least it would seem that way to anyone who didn’t know him as well as Jamie did. Even from this distance, Jamie could sense something in him. Something wrong. Barely held back. He couldn't help but think of that night so long ago back at university when John had gotten wasted at a party and called Jamie to pick him up. It wasn’t like John to drink and certainly not to excess. It had been that night, with that same pained look on his face, that John had accidentally admitted his feelings for Jamie. 

Oh God. He still had them.

Joe gave Claire away, she took Jamie's hands, and the priest started the service. Jamie mouthed the words, "You're beautiful," to Claire, and she smiled. She wasn't nervous, and it wasn't her ability to compartmentalize her emotions either. There had been no tears when Jamie had proposed to her, but logic. She'd said yes because it was the logical thing to do. They were comfortable together.

But standing here now, in front of quite literally God and everyone they cared about, watching Claire say her vows, Jamie couldn’t see tomorrow, nor the next day. She was his past. And God, he felt absolutely wretched for it.

_What matters is every day that comes after and the person you choose to give those days to._

This was an absolute disaster. This would all be over soon, and then he and John would go their separate ways, go back to _My Roommate in College_. No more whisky and cards or chess. No more easy silence. No more working together on a shared goal, no more long talks about everything and nothing.

_Fuck, what do I do?_

Claire squeezed his hands and raised her eyebrows expectantly. Shit, it was his turn. 

"I… owe ye the largest apology in the history of apologies," Jamie said. Claire's mouth fell open and a handful of guests let out rather dramatic gasps of surprise. "This is a terrible idea, Claire." _Oh, God, what the hell am I doing?_

“Jamie,” she whispered through her teeth, mouth still clenched into a smile. “What are you doing? Whatever it is we can talk about it later, okay?” 

Jamie gave her a sad smile and managed through some miracle not to look at John, probably still standing in the back, the last guardian of the sanity of this whole affair. “This isnae what either of us really want.” He lowered his voice. “Be honest. Pretend it’s just us: are we here because we want to be or because it’s what’s expected of us? Are we both just too stubborn to admit we’re wrong?”

Claire stood there staring at him with wide eyes. She opened her mouth as if she were planning to argue but no words came out. She looked out at the crowd and then back to Jamie. “Jesus H. Roosevelt Christ. You’re _actually_ leaving me at the altar, aren’t you?” She took a step back. “Do you know how embarrassing this is?” she whispered again.

“Weel, I have an idea, aye.” Jamie risked a glance at every important person in their lives, but looked over them to make sure John was still in the back of the room. He was. “I’m so sorry, Claire. I’m an arse, and I ken that. But think about it. Is it more logical that we end it now or wait for it to take lawyers and nastiness? Ye dinna need me, Claire.” God, if she demanded an explanation… the only person in this entire church who knew he was bi was his sister Jenny. Jamie’s stomach twisted into horrible knots, and his heart managed to stop beating and ratchet up to double time simultaneously. _Don’t lock your knees_.

“Why?” Claire shook her head. “Why bloody now? You asked _me_ to marry _you_. What changed?” 

_Fuck_. There was absolutely no good answer to this. The best Jamie could think of was honesty and do everything he could to keep it kind. “The worst of it is, I dinna think anything changed. I care for ye. And after being together for three years, this seemed like the right thing to do at the time. We got comfortable.” Unlike this entire conversation, kept intimately between _a hundred_ additional people. “And somewhere along the way, I think we ignored the fact that the spark was gone and kept going because it seemed like the only logical thing to do. Ye deserve yer fairy tale, Claire. And I’m no Prince Charming.”

“No,” she snapped. “You’re right. You’re not.” There were tears in her eyes, but she pulled herself together, and turned with her skirt gathered in hands. “I’m sorry, I can’t.” It was unclear who she was saying it to but she was down the stairs hustling back down the aisle before Jamie could say anything else. 

Jenny gawked at Jamie, gave him a hard glare, then picked up her long skirt and went after Claire. 

“Have ye lost yer mind, man?” Ian hissed at him through a forced smile as if everyone else in the church hadn’t just watched the groom dump his bride at the altar.

“Aye, I think so. Excuse me.” Jamie’s long stride took him down the aisle quickly, and he swore at himself on every step. It probably looked like he was going after Claire until he made a sharp right where Claire and Jenny had turned left. Taking hold of John’s arm, Jamie steered him toward a corner at least a little removed from the curious eyes in the quietly murmuring church. “We need to talk.”

“Jamie.” John kept his voice low, his expression twisted to show his confusion. “What are you thinking? Are you alright? I’m worried about you.”

"No," Jamie said, laughing. "No, I'm not alright. I'm absolutely mad. Because I was standing up there and I realized what you probably realized a month ago, which is that Claire and I were doomed to total failure or bitter misery. And I realized that ye were standing back here wi' yer broken heart in yer hands and all I wanted to do was put it back together." He took John's hand in his and someone in the crowd behind him swore in surprise. An instinctive fear knotted in his stomach and Jamie did his best to ignore it and the fact that the crowd had fallen dead silent. 

"For the last few months, the absolute best part of my day has been seeing ye, being with ye. The thought of that going away tears my guts out, John." Jamie couldn't have locked his knees then if he'd tried because they were shaking. _This is fucking insane_. "I want to give my next days to you. As many as ye'll take."

For a moment, John just stared at him, but then a bewildered smile stretched across his face. “Did I… did I hear you correctly? You… But Jamie, you’re not… are you?” There was a note of hopefulness in John’s voice. 

"I dinna suppose there's any possible way to keep it a secret anymore." Jamie hadn't even felt this exposed standing bare-arsed naked in two feet of snow in front of the fraternity house. But John's hand was solid in his and looking into his eyes was the safest place in the world. "I am. And I've fallen rather madly in love wi' you." Jamie gestured at the packed pews behind him. "'Mad' apparently being the operative word."

John bolted forward, as quick as Jamie had ever seen him move. “Come here,” he said, pulling Jamie down to him, crushing their mouths together in a kiss more than a decade in the making. If Jamie hadn’t been sure of his decision before, he was damn sure of it now. This was exactly how a kiss was meant to feel. 

John pulled away for a breath. “I love you too,” he said. “I reckon I always have.” 

It was worth it. The shame and embarrassment of dumping Claire at the altar—Dear God, he still felt like an arse. The icy terror of confessing his feelings for John in front of everyone, coming out in the most public way imaginable, _and in church_. Well, no one could ever say that Jamie Fraser did things halfway. 

But it was worth it because John loved him, and that made it all a success. Jamie kissed John again, everything getting clear and yet blurry and a whirlwind and wonderful. Sweat made his tuxedo shirt stick to his back, and Jamie tugged at his bow tie when he pulled away. "Is it suddenly verra hot in here? I think I would rather be anywhere else right now. With you, so that we're clear."

John looked over his shoulder at the wedding guests whose expressions were a mix of shock, horror, excitement, and confusion, then looked back at Jamie. “We should probably leave. And quickly.” 

**Author's Note:**

> **Cast**   
> 
> 
> John Grey - iihappydaysii
> 
> Jamie Fraser - MistressPandora
> 
> Claire Beauchamp - iihappydaysii


End file.
